


make your heart beat in reverse

by Verbyna



Series: Suitehearts [5]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Depression, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Light BDSM, M/M, Queer Themes, Road Trips, how Kent Parson got his groove back
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-02-04
Packaged: 2019-10-22 11:15:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17661521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Verbyna/pseuds/Verbyna
Summary: “You could literally go to the Grand Canyon every time you get two days off. Just get in the car and drive.”





	make your heart beat in reverse

**Author's Note:**

> title from fob; many thanks to the #hellsquad, who've been very patient as i chipped away at this story and who constantly spark joy. (SummerFrost also wrote a couple of lines of dialogue last winter that ended up in the finished product. if anyone can identify them, i will write you any prompt in this 'verse.)

**July 2015**

It takes Travie about a minute after he gets to Kent’s house to figure out that something is seriously wrong. Most of that is down to denial, even if he flew out to Vegas instead of going to see his brother in New York because he felt like Parse needed him.

That’s exactly the sort of thing that Chuck keeps telling him not to do. _You can’t just fix everything, bro. You can’t just show up and get up in people’s business._

Parse is, like, always drunk when he calls since the off-season started. Travie’s visited a couple of times and Parse was okay, but he’s clearly not doing so hot when he’s by himself. When Travie called him last night he was really quiet. His voice was shot to hell, like he’d shouted in a club or smoked two packs or blown someone who wasn’t careful.

Travie hasn’t even moved his suitcase into the actual house. The first thing Parse does, after throwing his front door open, is push a handle of vodka at Travie. He doesn’t offer a glass. He just gets rid of it, and that’s a little… yeah.

He looks like shit. In a Parse way, which is still moisturized as fuck, fresh haircut, better than most people on their best day, but for Parse, he looks like shit, and he takes the bottle back as soon as Travie sits down on the sectional. Travie lets him have it; hair of the dog got him through enough hangovers that he’s not even judging.

“In the neighborhood, bud?”

“Um. Surprise?” Travie says, rubbing the back of his neck where his perma-sunburn is itching.

“Cool. Wanna shower? You know where everything is,” Parse says, waving his free hand loosely at the stairs.

Last time Travie was here, Parse blew him on the landing. That’s maybe something they do now, if twice is a pattern. Travie gets stuck looking up at the banister he gripped hard enough to bruise his palms and almost misses the sound of Parse unscrewing the bottle top.

“Come with,” Travie hears himself saying. He looks away from the stairs and catches the split-second where Parse’s eyes widen. Parse turns it into a smirk, but Travie files it away.

“Is this a booty call, Nelly? Did you legit fly out for--”

Travie smirks back and says, “Might have. Come on.”

He doesn’t get up until Parse does. The bottle comes with, but Parse does that sometimes, forgets he’s holding something until he starts looking for it. When they’re Skyping and it’s his phone or whatever, Travie always points it out. He doesn’t mention the bottle this time. With a little luck Parse will forget about it, and then he won’t be too drunk to get off.

Parse leads him into his en suite, not the guest bathroom. His bedroom is spotless, so he’s been sleeping on the couch; they strip fast and throw their clothes on the bed, and it looks more natural like that, like Parse actually lives here. Travie gets tangled up in his sweaty shirt and hears Parse laughing at him, muffled by the fabric.

“A little help,” he deadpans, so Parse will put his hands on him and keep laughing a little longer.

 

*

 

Travie never shivers when Parse touches him.

Isn’t it weird? He wants Parse’s hands on him all the time, wants his mouth and the weight of him, the same body that Travie watched so closely on TV back in school; but when Parse touches him, it doesn’t feel like some epic thing.

It just feels like the word _finally._ It just feels like saying _yes._

 

*

 

He tosses his shirt on the bed and follows Parse into the bathroom. They jump at the first cold jet of water, then pass each other soap, shower gel, a soft brush.

“Tell me something good,” Parse asks eventually.

Travie has to think about it until they’re both dripping suds and jostling for space under the multiple sprays. Something good - it can’t be people, because Parse had bad luck with those. And it can’t be winning, because that doesn’t help.

“You could literally go to the Grand Canyon every time you get two days off. Just get in the car and drive.”

“Oh yeah? Cool,” Parse says. “When I get two days off I just go to the gym. How do you know that?”

Travie doesn’t answer the question, because the answer is weird. He finishes rinsing off his hair and takes the conditioner Parse is holding out instead.

Parse is flushed in the heat, lashes and hair darker than usual. It’s almost like he’s a different person, a normal person. And like, Travie knows that Parse is going through some shit, and it’s been going on long enough that dealing with it is just part of who Parse is at this point; but it got worse lately. Baseline misery doesn’t prepare you for things to get _worse,_ it just wears you down.

But it doesn’t have to catch up with Parse in his sterile house, drinking himself numb. It doesn’t have to corner him.

“Do you wanna go?”

“To the gym?”

“No, the Grand Canyon. Pack a bag and go see some epic fucking rock formations.” 

_Be small for once, so your problems look small,_ Travie doesn’t say. _Let me take you somewhere nice._

Travie wants to do that for Parse, but suddenly he also wants to blow him in the shower while Parse decides, so he steps back and then kneels on the smooth cement floor.

It shifts the air around them; makes Travie want to stretch, feel himself shift in his own skin. Parse wipes some water out of his eyes to look down at Travie, startled.

“Wanna?” Travie asks, smiling up.

Parse opens and closes his mouth a couple of times, then finally nods, so Travie grins at him again and pulls him closer by the hips to rub his cheek against Parse’s stomach.

Neither of them is all the way hard yet, but they’re getting there.

“What the fuck,” Parse says, pushing his fingers through Travie’s wet hair. It feels really nice against the shaved sides of his undercut, and then it feels even nicer when Parse reaches the back, makes a fist, and pulls Travie’s head back by the roots. “You wanna go to the Grand Canyon, Nels?”

“Mm-hmm,” Travie groans. “In your car. I’ll drive, you can sleep in the back.”

Parse lifts an eyebrow. “Which one?”

“The big car, duh. That one doesn’t look too athlete-y. Could be any rich asshole driving.” 

“Oh my God,” Parse blasphemes, but by now his dick is hard, so Travie shakes his head to get out of Parse’s grip and pushes him against the wall to suck him off.

The wall is cold; Parse tries to twist away from it, but Travie keeps him there by the hips, which he’s still holding on to, thumbs pressed hard under Parse’s hipbones. He groans again at the first taste.

It’s really close to his fantasies from high school, actually: holding Kent Parson down to suck him off at his house in Vegas, both of them playing in the NHL, about to go see some epic fucking rock formations in Parse’s truck.

Travie will never tell Parse why he knows how to drive from here to the Grand Canyon. He pictured all that before Chicago and Seattle and finding out that the sort of sad Parse is can’t be fixed, only managed. It won’t be like what Travie used to imagine. It would just make Parse sad for a different reason.

Travie is good at taking what he can get, though, so he sucks Parse off harder, bruises his hips a little, and waits for Parse to come before asking about the road trip again.

“Fine, I’ll go to the Grand Canyon with you,” Parse says, held up between the wall and Travie’s upper body. Travie hides his smile in Parse’s clean, sweet-smelling hair.

“I’ll go pack you a bag.”

“Why do I need a--”

“Reasons!”

The only thing Travie digs out of his bag before he tosses it in the trunk of Parse’s car is a tube of arnica gel for the bruises on Parse’s hips. Just in case Parse wants it.

 

*

 

Parse sleeps all the way through the Arizona Strip to the North Rim.

Travie drives, up and up, into the spruce forests. He hopes, but can’t pray, that by the time Parse wakes up, Parse will see something so big and beautiful that his sadness will look as small as he does right now in the backseat.

When Spenser’s dad died last year, Travie took him sailing. Spenser said the open water helped. _Made things relative._ And then he got engaged to a lesbian who lets him do whatever he wants as long as he doesn’t damage her career, so maybe that’s not the best proof of concept, but Parse isn’t Spenser, so who even knows.

(Maybe it didn’t work with Spense because Travie left, at the end of that trip. He left for hockey, for Seattle, for Parse who was already a friend. Maybe if Travie doesn’t leave Parse alone with this, it’ll be different, and the problems will stay smaller.)

In the meantime - Travie checks the rear mirror again - at least Parse’s getting some sleep. He sleeps all the way through Arizona to the North Rim, where Travie books them a room at the only lodge around and then sits in the car, breathing slowly, until Parse wakes up on his own.

 

*

 

Travie got them some food and took first shower, because Parse sometimes needs a little space after he’s really honest. If he doesn’t get the space, he goes all fake and happy, and fake-happy is the opposite of what Travie’s aiming for here.

When he gets out of the bathroom, buck naked, Parse is sitting in a rustic rocking chair. He tilts his chin at the nightstand, where Travie emptied his pockets, and says, “Your brother called. He’s 2 on the phone, right?”

Travie nods. He hopes Kent won’t ask him why there aren’t any names for Chuck, and Benji, and Kent himself.

“I think he left a voicemail,” Kent says.

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll listen to it later,” Travie says, and crosses the room to light the fire. It may be the middle of summer, but they’re also in the middle of the mountains, and he’s naked.

“Travie.”

“Yeah?”

“Were you supposed to go see Chuck right now?” Kent asks, and Travie almost drops the big box of matches he found on the mantel. He opens it carefully instead and squats to poke at the kindling, half-hoping his ass will distract Kent from the question.

No such luck. “Why are you here?”

“I’m here because,” Travie starts to say, but he doesn’t know how to explain it. He stops and thinks for a second, strikes the first match. “It’s like, you know how when you’re a kid, you can get over being sad if you see something shiny? Something really cool?”

He turns his head to make sure Parse nods. This is important.

“Well, it works better if someone else points it out, right? It’s better if you see it with someone who cares about you, because if they care, they won’t try to pretend you’re not sad, they’ll just hold your hand and point at something cool. And then, even if you’re still sad, you’re not alone, and you’re so _there_ that you’ll remember everything else better than the sadness.”

He thinks he might’ve overexplained it. The fire’s burning merrily now, though, so he can go lie down on the bed. He pats the coverlet and watches Parse get up and walk over. The mattress dips when Parse lies down, and Travie would love to lean into the motion and roll half on top of Parse, but he still looks so fragile.

“Penny for your thoughts,” he says, and Parse’s breath comes out in a whoosh.

“It’s like I’m here but I could be. I don’t know. Anywhere. Same fucking difference.”

“No,” Travie says, from somewhere deep in his lungs. His throat feels scratched raw. “You’re _here.”_ Be here with me, he means, but it came out less honest than that.

He doesn’t know how to chase Parse into his own head. The best he can do is steal him away, and he did, but he just got the body. Who the fuck knows where Parse’s mind is? Not on this view, not on Travie.

“I miss New York,” Parse says eventually. “No one ever gets like this in New York.”

“Yeah? How come?” Travie asks, a little desperate.

“It’s not like anywhere else. And I’m from there, so like, it’s the default setting. Either I’m doing something or I’m doing something outside the city.” Parse tilts his head to watch Travie from the corner of his eye. “How ‘bout you? Where’re you from?”

“My parents’ big-ass house. Or Scotland, I don’t know. For my parents it’s Scotland, me and Chuck just come from them. And hockey.”

“Hell yeah,” Parse says quietly. “Home’s where the hockey is.”

“So you don’t miss it? The city?”

Parse breaks into a grin. Travie stares at it, blindsided. “Never looked back,” he says, and Travie suddenly gets it - just because some place is easy, it doesn’t mean shit if you can’t do what you’re meant to.

“Wanna get out of those dirty clothes?” he asks Parse, whose grin turns into a smirk, then slowly slides off his face. He rolls closer to Travie and presses his face into a pillow.

“‘M tired,” he says, muffled.

“That’s cool too, babe. C’mon, let’s get under the covers. Let’s sleep off the drive.”

He ends up yanking the blankets out from under Parse, then he stays awake for a long time, looking at the shapes the fire makes on the ceiling. Parse moves closer, little by little, until he’s so close that his hair’s ticklish on Travie’s shoulder.

Travie presses his lips to the top of Parse’s head, not really a kiss, and finally closes his eyes.

 

*

 

Travie dreams about horses. The horse he learned how to ride on, but bigger and slower, fighting him the whole way to - somewhere, somewhere important that he couldn’t reach but also couldn’t stop trying to get to. He tries and tries and fails. Keeps failing.

He wakes up and Parse is watching him. He’s watching Travie’s dick, which is hard, but also his face, which is probably doing something.

“Nightmare?’

“No,” Travie says. “Morning breath?”

“Fuck it.”

They make out, still lazy, like they’re both dreaming. The sun’s not up yet, but the grey predawn light is enough to see Parse by: bleached eyelashes, the curve of his ear when they turn their heads to deepen the kiss. They’ve never done this with each other before, but they’ve both done it so many times that it’s easy to make it good.

(Travie hopes he’ll remember this forever. He keeps his memories in his body, and the way Parse feels against him right now - God, Travie could live for it. He’d gladly spend the rest of his time chasing it into all the bodies that’ll have him, it’s that good. That _right.)_

Parse breaks it off with a shaky inhale and stretches out on the bed. Travie wraps their fingers loosely together and pants at the ceiling, knowing that he should say something, but he can’t think of anything at all.

“You should listen to Chuck’s message,” Parse whispers.

And just like that, they’re back to reality.

 

*

 

After Travie tells him where he is, Chuck doesn’t bring up the fact that Travie didn’t show up in NYC. He talks about his new girlfriend, who’s awesome, and the algorithm he’s figuring out for his presentation at the Hockey Analytics Conference next spring.

That takes almost an hour. Travie has opinions.

Eventually, though, Chuck does the thing where he brings the conversation back around to what he actually wants to discuss without Travie noticing.

“So,” he says. “You’re babysitting Parson at a Grand Canyon lodge. How’s that working out for you?”

“Hell if I know. I’m treading hella water, bro,” Nelly says, reluctant to put words to it. He scratches at the back of his neck, where his summer skin hurts the most. “He’s like. Kent fucking Parson, you know?”

“I know,” Chuck says, because he actually, genuinely does. “But I feel like I should remind you that you said to smack you if this happened.”

“You’re not here to smack me.”

Chuck snorts. “I wouldn’t smack you anyway, you’re too nice. But you _did_ say to smack you if you ever put any of them on a pedestal. Especially Parson,” he adds meaningfully.

Travie blushes, which makes the back of his neck throb harder. It’s ridiculous. He’s ridiculous.

He can see Parse sleeping from out here on the porch, though, curled up on the bed safe and sound, and finds himself smiling anyway.

There’s a word for this - wistful? “Define wistful,” he asks Chuck.

“It’s when you want something in your gut, but there’s something sad in it.”

They both sit with that for a moment.

“You know what, I’m gonna go. I think Parse is waking up. We have to eat, and then I wanna go hiking, and then I wanna bl--”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’ll just go do that.”

“Make yourself proud, kid,” Chuck says. He sighs, hums, and hangs up. Travie weighs the phone in his hand, but Chuck’s gonna tell him eventually what he just swallowed back to keep the conversation going. Chuck’s really big on timing.

There’s no point going back inside right now. It’s nice to take a break, even if Travie wishes he had some music.

There’s something missing, and it’s not sex or music - it’s not anything Travie can fix.

It’s the way Parse’s pretty eyes keep skipping away when Travie tries to get a read on him. The way he didn’t even moisturize until Travie dug up the wet wipes and serum from Parse’s bag and dropped them on the bed. How Travie wishes they could drink themselves happy, but knows better than to grab the tequila from the trunk of Parse’s car.

 _Wistful,_ Travie thinks, looking in the direction he knows the Canyon is.

In his gut, he knows what he wants, but Parse is sleeping even though he can’t be tired, isn’t here even though he’s literally here. Travie has to keep pointing at things he hopes Parse will remember instead.

Kinda how Chuck sat him down when Travie failed English in grade 9 and hit play on Parse’s draft video.

Something like that.

 

*

 

It’s weird to spend so much time alone with Parse.

Travie takes all his cash and goes to the lodge’s reception desk, where he buys the clerk’s packed lunch to take back to the room. He props Parse up on all the pillows in the room and eats half the food, trying very hard not to let Parse catch him count the bites Parse takes.

Parse has such fine wrists. Travie stares at them instead of counting bites, and the thing is that Parse could (and has) benched Nelly’s bodyweight, but his wrists are still thin and delicate, and it’s fucking _undoing_ Travie right now. At some point, Parse was that delicate all over.

Travie can’t fucking unsee it, and he follows it up the stark line of Parse’s arms and shoulders to Parse’s neck - it’s so unhinged to even know this, but Parse’s neck is the one place he looks his age, because he puts on deodorant and perfume before he moisturizes and doesn’t go back over it for skincare. Travie sat on the rim of several bathtubs and watched this, and it’s secretly his favorite part of Parse.

It’s like that now, but every moment is the same level of intimate: Parse’s fist hiding his mouth as he scratches at a piece of romaine between his incisors, Parse’s fingers gone translucent in the midday light when he tries to button Travie’s flannel the right way up. Every extra movement he makes is wired into Travie, learned gestures and annoyance and care when he reaches for Travie.

They can’t talk. Travie tried, but Parse doesn’t really want anyone to understand what he’s going through, and now the sun’s going down again and they’ve been at the lodge for two days. Travie’s not building any pedestals, but that just means he’s focusing on Parse’s body.

“Please,” Parse says, and it goes down like a shot.

“Tell me,” Travie says, face buried in Parse’s neck.

“Please,” Parse says again, and Travie exhales against Parse’s neck and stops trying to talk.

It’s weird because there’s no guesswork to it: Travie nudges his nose against Parse’s sternum and Parse leans back to take off his shirt, Parse drags his hand across Travie’s jaw and Travie follows his fingers until he’s lying on top of Parse on the bed. Parse inhales extra deep, and Travie takes some of his weight off Parse’s chest; Travie digs his nails into Parse’s sides, and Parse’s hips jump off the bed, and then they’re both groaning at how fucking good it feels.

 _“Please,”_ says Parse, “fuck me,” and Travie shakes his head against Parse’s collarbone.

“The stuff’s in the car. Don’t wanna stop,” Travie says, though he would, if Parse really wanted his dick.

“Don’t stop,” Parse asks.

So Travie doesn’t.

 

*

 

He can’t convince Parse to go hiking, or go see the actual canyon, or eat anything for lunch except the peach yogurt that the receptionist had in the bag with the sandwiches they had for breakfast. It’s not enough for an athlete, but Travie can’t force a grown man to eat, so he pats Parse on the shoulder and goes to sit outside on the steps with his phone.

He’s tempted to put his head in his hands and scream very quietly, but Parse would see that through the window, so instead he plays Sudoku and takes deep, nature-y breaths until he can’t see anything but beautiful, beautiful numbers. 

It actually gives him an idea for an algorithm Chuck was stuck on for a career stat, so he’s recording a voice message when his phone rings, _3._

He picks up before the first ring is done. “Benji, dude! Tell me something good.”

“Um,” says Benji. “Hi? You answered really fast. Just a sec, I gotta - oh my God, bro, stop scratching that tattoo or I’m gonna tape your hands to the table -”

“Legs of the chair,” Travie suggests, trying not to laugh. Fuck, he misses the boys a _lot._

“What?” Benji asks. It sounds like there’s a brief scuffle, then he goes, “Legs?”

“Tape his hands to the legs of the chair if you want it to hold, Benj. Is that Soup? Did he get that cool vampire skull thing?”

“Hell yeah I did,” says Soup. “Also, you’re on speaker, and if you don’t stop troubleshooting Corey’s bondage technique, I’m turning this fucking car around.”

“Oh my _God,_ ” Benji says again.

“Is he blushing?” Travie asks, delighted.

Soup snorts. “Like a fucking tomato. Anyway, Travis, you might be wondering why we’re calling you.”

“Not really?”

“Benji does call you a lot,” Soup allows. “But this time there’s an actual reason. I know! There’s a first time for everything, you know what they say.”

“The rookie,” Benji interrupts.

“Rookie?” Travie asks. “The Swedish kid?”

“The very same,” Soup says, sounding pleased that Travie remembered. “Milo Karlsson, who was supposed to stay with Corey.”

“So… he’s not staying with Benji now? Where’s he staying?”

“Uh, you? If you can come back by tomorrow?” Benji says.

Soup sighs deeply. “Grandma would roll in her grave if she heard you asking for a favor like that.”

“Your grandma’s alive,” Travie says, squinting back to check on Parse, then something occurs to him. “Wait, is she okay? Do you need to go home?”

“Nice going, jackass,” Benji says. Then, “She’s fine, Nels. Everyone’s fine. We just signed up for a training thing with Jack, a couple of guys canceled last minute.”

“Zimmermann,” Travie says. He hopes his voice is neutral, because he’s really _not._ Even if Parse never came out and said it, Travie is pretty sure where Parse’s problems started.

“Yeah, Uncle Bob’s kid. So we’d really appreciate it if you could look after the rookie for a week. We’ll cover your flight from New York,” Soup offers.

A falcon flies by. At least he thinks it’s a falcon, but he’s not a bird expert. Travie blinks stupidly at it, and oh yeah, he never told anyone where he is, did he?

“Do you know if there are raptors other than falcons in the Grand Canyon?”

“Oh yeah, condors and hawks,” Soup tells him. “Condors are fucking awesome. Why are we talking about them?”

“Um,” Travie says. He takes another deep, nature-y breath, and says, “I’m in the Grand Canyon. With, uh, Kent?”

There’s a moment of complete silence. Travie moves the phone away from his ear to make sure the call isn’t disconnected and misses whatever Benji says next.

“What?”

“Kent Parson?” Soup asks carefully. “Or some dude called Kent you picked up and went to the Grand Canyon with?”

“Rude,” Benji mutters.

“No, Kent Parson. So. Yeah.”

“You know what, I’m not even gonna ask,” Soup says after another pause. This is why they’re bros, probably. “Can you make it back to Seattle tomorrow, or is this a roadtrip thing? With Kent Parson?”

“Let’s stop saying Kent Parson,” Travie suggests, finally giving in and putting his head in his hands. Or like, one hand, because he’s holding the phone with the other one. “I think I can make it. I gotta ask him, but yeah. _Crisse.”_

“Don’t go all Canadian, Travis,” says Soup. “Corey’s poor heart can’t take it.”

There’s the clear sound of a slap, and Travie smiles into his hand.

“Don’t worry about the tickets,” Travie adds, as the thought occurs to him. “My trust fund came through this year. It’s a lot of money, I don’t even know what to do with it.”

“Charity and tattoos, duh,” Soup says, and then there’s another scuffle, and then the call disconnects.

It’s a good suggestion, actually.

Before he goes back inside to check on Parse, and ask if he wants to go stay with Travie for a week ( _please, please say yes,_ ), Travie tells Siri to remind him to look for youth charities in Seattle.

He also remembers to grab the lube and the condoms from the car this time.

 

*

 

Travie doesn’t ask Parse right away. He doesn’t know how to ask without making it weird. And this whole thing is weird, but it’s also weird within one day’s drive of Parse’s house. Asking him to fly to Seattle to look after another team’s rookie is, like, next level.

They’ve been hanging out for a while, and now they’re fucking, apparently, but they’re not really there yet, Travie thinks.

They hang out in bed for the rest of the day. Travie plays Sudoku on his phone. Parse takes dozens of selfies, and it hurts a little to see him switching on for the camera and then switching back off while he edits, but at least he did his hair and put on a clean shirt for it.

“Do you know anything about, like, charity work?” Travie asks him at one point.

“I have the foundation,” Parse says, frowning at the filters.

“The vintage one. No, the other - yeah, looks good.”

Travie puts his phone down and leans up on his elbow, sliding his fingers under the hem of Parse’s shirt. Parse arches a little into it, so Travie scoots closer and sweeps his hand up and down Parse’s back idly.

“I wanna do something with my trust fund,” he tells Parse, mostly thinking out loud.

“Mmm. Yeah?”

“Soup says charity, and like. I already do charity with the team? But I wanna do something by myself. For queer kids, maybe. If I can’t, then kids who can’t afford hockey gear.”

Parse tosses his phone on the nightstand and lays down on his front with his arms crossed over his head. His eyes are closed. He’s so fucking pretty, Travie can’t even take it; he sits up and settles on Parse’s legs. He wants to give Parse a massage, if they haven’t reached the point of hugs yet.

Parse melts into it. Travie’s pretty good; he hooked up a few times with a trainee massage therapist back in Chicago. It was the only useful learning experience he had before he was traded.

Parse’s back is really tense, but so was Travie’s, whenever Alice practiced on him. He wouldn’t know what to do if Parse was relaxed from the start.

“God,” Parse groans after a couple of minutes. “Right there, a little-”

Travie pulls Parse’s shirt all the way off and finds the knot before Parse has to move and point it out.

Parse’s body is amazing, like, objectively, but it’s even better like this, solid and warm and sensitive. Travie’s dick ended up right under Parse’s ass, and he can’t resist rocking a little. It makes his hands spasm on Parse’s ribs and Parse arches automatically, and then Travie is so turned on that his breathing speeds up.

He leans down over Parse to whisper in his ear, “Did you mean it?”

Parse just groans low in his throat and arches against Travie again. Travie swallows and clenches his jaw, then noses behind Parse’s ear.

“Did you mean it? Do you want to me to fuck you, Kenny?”

He freezes for a second when the _Kenny_ slips out, but Parse moans and grabs the back of Travie’s neck to hold him there. Travie drops his weight on Parse and rolls his hips to hear him moan again. His neck hurts where Parse grabbed him. He’s almost all the way hard, just from this; he holds his breath until Parse nods.

“I’ll make it so good, babe,” Travie promises on an exhale, and Parse shivers and nods again. “I’ll make it so good for you, you just stay here and I’ll do all the work, yeah?”

He sits up to pull his shirt over his head one-handed, because he physically can’t stop touching Parse, squeezing the back of his tanned neck and petting down his spine. Parse starts to rise onto his elbows, but Travie gently presses him back down to the mattress.

He can’t even describe the noise Parse makes. “I’ve got you, babe,” Travie whispers, a little choked up.

He can’t resist lying back on top of Parse while he reaches under the pillow to grab the lube and a strip of condoms.

Parse makes another noise when he notices the brand, but it’s not like he doesn’t already know that Travie has a big dick. It’s instinct, Travie knows, and it’s a thrill when Parse just bites his bottom lip and presses up against the hand on his neck. Travie slides it underneath so it rests on Parse’s throat, no pressure.

When Parse moans this time, Travie feels it all the way to his shoulder. In his chest, then in his dick when he rolls against Parse and gets the same broken sound out of him.

Travie lifts his hips to push his shorts off and bites gently at Parse’s shoulder. It feels only right to lift Parse’s arms and set them above his head, wrists crossed on the pillow under the palm of Travie’s hand, while he reaches his other hand to push Parse’s underwear down below the curve of his ass.

“I’ve got you,” he tells Parse again, and reaches for the lube to set it in the curve of Parse’s spine. His hand keeps moving up. “Suck,” he says, and swallows drily when Parse immediately sucks Travie’s thumb into his mouth, teasing with his tongue like it’s Travie’s dick, moaning softly around it.

Travie blinks and gets back on track after a few seconds, clenching his thighs against the sides of Parse’s legs and tracing down the crack of his ass with the thumb that Parse just got wet for him. Parse inhales sharply when Travie reaches his hole, flexes his thighs like he wants to press them together, and when he realizes that Travie’s already doing that for him, he breathes out on a sob.

Travie squeezes Parse’s wrists gently and rests the palm of his other hand across the top of Parse’s fantastic ass, pressing down with his thumb. He can feel Parse rolling his hips against the mattress, and he doesn’t mind, really, unless Parse gets off before Travie’s inside him.

Next time, he’ll tell Parse not to come until Travie decides how to get him off. Actually, next time he’ll rim Parse instead of teasing him with his thumb while the lube warms up.

“I bet you taste amazing,” he whispers in Parse’s ear. “Fuck, you’re so warm, babe, you feel so fucking good already,” he whispers, and Parse is full-on panting now, face pressed into the pillow.

“Gonna get my fingers in there. Wish it was my mouth, but you feel so good right here. Love having you under me, love it, love it, love it,” Travie mumbles, not sure he’s making any sense, but even if he didn’t, Parse still moans and nods.

Travie grabs the lube and undoes the cap with his teeth - he can’t let go of Parse’s wrists, Parse likes it too much - and squeezes some in the dip above Parse’s ass. Parse doesn’t jump, Travie made sure it was body-temperature, just keens quietly when Travie gets three of his fingers wet and trails one down to start him off.

Parse is tight, but he knows how to relax for this. Travie’s very grateful for it, because it doesn’t take long before Travie can add another finger, and he goes straight for Parse’s prostate this time. Parse groans and tries to spread his legs, so Travie helpfully knees Parse’s thighs apart and settles between them, whispering nonsense.

Parse is rolling his hips into the mattress faster by now. “Stop,” Travie says, because he doesn’t want to hurt Parse, now or ever.

He has to take a moment to re-center himself when Parse just… stops. As easy as that.

When he gets control of his voice back, Travie says, “Slow, babe, yeah? I’ll get you there, just go slow. Deep breath.”

The third finger goes in more easily than the others. Parse is so relaxed that Travie slides right in, and it’s hard to keep everything slow and steady when he guesses that Parse would love to be fucked hard and fast and merciless.

Parse wants to be fucked to forget himself, but that’s not what Travie wants to give him. Parse is not Spenser; the last thing he needs is something that feels like punishment.

He drops the condoms on Parse’s back, fumbling one-handed, and Parse snorts. Travie giggles, light-headed and horny as fuck, and it sets Parse off, and then they’re just laughing helplessly, with Travie’s lubed-up fingers sliding all over Parse’s ribcage.

“Fuck, Trav. Just do it already, oh my God,” Parse wheezes eventually.

He’s still shaking with laughter when Travie manages to roll on the condom, get some lube on it, and starts pressing in as slow as he can.

“So fucking good,” Travie groans, more out of shock than anything. He can’t help himself; Parse is taking it so well, shaking but not moving while Travie makes room for himself. “You’re so fucking good, Kenny.”

“Please-please-please,” Parse whispers. He breaks off on a moan when Travie bottoms out and gives him a short, hard thrust right away.

“Like that, babe?”

“God, let me move, let me-”

Travie kisses his shoulder and then licks the salt off the same patch of skin. He thrusts a few more times before he tells Parse that he can move, and Parse _thanks him for it,_ and if this is the only time they ever do this, it’ll be enough.

(It won’t be, but Travie can tell himself anything in the middle of sex and believe it until he comes. It’s, like, a superpower.)

 

*

 

Travie’s not sure what wakes him up, at first. It’s way too early for his internal clock to wake him - in the off-season, he’s never up before 9, even if he goes to the gym at 9:15. It feels like dawn, and he doesn’t want to open his eyes. He reaches across the sheets.

“I’m over here,” Parse says quietly, from the foot of the bed.

“Kenny,” Travie says. He’s still half asleep, so it slips out, but it instantly wakes him up. What if Parse doesn’t want to be called that? No one else calls him that. What if Parse doesn’t want to think about last night and how he reacted to hearing it then?

When he looks at Parse, though, he relaxes back into the sheets.

“I saw it,” Parse says.

“Mmm? What did you see, babe?”

They smile at each other for a second.

“I saw the Canyon. Went out to catch the sunrise.”

“Epic fucking rock formations?”

“For the motherfucking win.”

“Get back in here,” Travie says, and holds up the edge of the blanket so Parse can lie back down. Travie can smell the outdoors on him. It’s really nice.

“Sorry I woke you,” Parse says, making himself a nest out of the pillows they dragged over from his bed before they passed out last night. “I just wanted you to know you were right.”

“Always a scary thing to hear,” Travie jokes.

Parse stops fluffing the pillows and gives him a disbelieving look. “You’ve literally been right about everything since we met, except for that tequila Soup gave you.”

Travie hums and lets it go. It’s so cozy, and he’s so tired. He really doesn’t feel like going back to Seattle today. That’s a four-hour drive and then a flight, and then they have to make the kid comfortable in, like, a new country that he just moved to.

Which… he should probably ask Parse if he wants to tag along.

They chill for a few minutes while Travie figures out how to ask. Things feel pretty different from yesterday. Not just because he fucked Parse, or because he held Parse down while he fucked him, which would be enough, but Parse’s whole vibe is different now than when they fell asleep last night.

He’s still considering the best approach when Parse beats him to it.

“I don’t wanna go home yet.”

“Oh thank God,” Travie groans. “I mean, that’s great!”

“Really,” Parse says, squinting at Travie, who gives him his toothiest smile. Parse lifts his eyebrows, still squinting.

“Wow, face journey. Anyway,” Travie says, “Benji and Soup have to go to a training camp, super last minute, and they asked me to look after our rookie. Karlsson?”

“He’s good,” Parse says. “When do we leave?”

The best part - the second best part, after Parse saying he’d go with Travie - is that he didn’t even stop to ask. Maybe he’s starting to get it, Travie thinks, as his heart picks up.

Maybe he’s starting to see how welcome he is in Travie’s life.

 

*

 

Seattle is way too far to drive on the deadline they’re on, so they have to drop off Parse’s car in Vegas and fly over. Parse drives this time, and Travie watches his hands, one on the wheel and the other on the gear shift.

“Why don’t you drive automatic?”

Parse’s mouth twitches. “Because I actually like driving? Doesn’t feel right if I can’t switch the fucking gears myself, dude.”

Travie hums and turns that over a couple of times. It’s about control; everything is, one way or another, with Parse. Travie thinks about that, then he considers the way Parse slept in the backseat on the way here while Travie drove, and how he let Travie hold him down.

The fir trees outside are giving way to desert again. They’re getting closer to sea level, and the temperature is climbing; Travie flips the switch to roll up his window.

He thinks, _Parse trusts me, at least a little._ He thinks, _holy shit, holy shit, holy shit._

“You okay there, man?”

“Uh-huh. Can I put on some music?”

Parse holds out the aux cord. Travie hooks up his phone and queues up Infinity on High, which immediately makes this trip feel like an alternate universe where he and Parse went to high school together.

“I used to listen to this with my bro Spense, like, all the time,” he tells Parse. It feels like so long ago, but it really isn’t; this album always makes him nostalgic. “His roommate Baz had a boner for the singer’s voice. Probably for Pete Wentz, too, but it’s not like we _talked_ about being queer in Catholic school.”

Parse snorts, then asks, “Do you still talk to your high school crowd?”

Travie snorts, too. “What crowd? No one wanted to be seen with me, I was pretty much the school slut. It was just me and Spense after Chuck graduated. And Baz. He hated Spenser’s guts and he was a huge hipster, so he couldn’t hang out with me, like, in public, but we got along fine. We follow each other on Twitter.”

“Shit,” Parse says, and when Travie looks at him, startled, Parse is frowning at the road.

“I didn’t fucking care, Kenny,” Travie tries to explain. He flicks the setlist up and down on the screen, nervous, because he needs Parse to get it. “Did ever tell you about my sixteenth birthday?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Right, so I was kinda on a date. I know better _now,_ that’s super not my scene, but it was Valentine’s, and she was really cute. It, uh. I ended up in her room? And then I went to Spenser’s room, and Baz came in. Did I mention Baz was the hottest guy in school?”

‘With you around?” Parse teases.

“Holy fuck, Parse, you don’t even know, it’s like they made him in a _lab._ There was this whole thing the year before, they found some lube in my room, whatever, but I guess he knew I wasn’t straight.” Travie smiles and waits.

He won’t mention that Baz made a move because he figured out that Travie was thirsty for Parse. Too much information, as Chuck would say.

“Wait,” Parse says slowly. “Did you…”

“I fucking did. Or he did, same thing.”

“Jesus Christ, I can’t believe you,” Parse says. It sounds like he’s trying not to laugh.

“And it was _great._ I didn’t give a shit what people thought about me anymore. He said I was handsome and fucked my brains out and it was like… it was like _hockey.”_

The look on Parse’s face is very complicated. Travie shrugs and taps on Hum Hallelujah for a replay, and they listen to the rest of the album without talking. He puts on Nelly Furtado next, and Parse sets off laughing when Maneater starts. Giggles, then laughs, then he’s basically convulsing in his seat.

“How is this the most basic road trip ever,” he wheezes. “Jesus.”

“This is my song, Parson. I’m basic.”

Parse should probably pull over if he’s gonna keep wheezing like that.

Still, the trip was worth it, just for that.

 

*

 

They drop off Parse’s car in long-term parking at McCarran and check into their flight. Parse bitches about having to throw out most of his products at security, and he keeps complaining until Travie points out that he uses most of the same shit anyway, and they’re going to his house.

Parse makes a face, but lets it go.

They both nap from takeoff to landing. Seattle is warm, but not as hot as Vegas or NYC would’ve been, and it’s not even raining, which Travie hopes won’t give the kid false hopes about his new home.

They take a taxi from the airport to Travie’s house. Parse can probably tell that Travie’s a little nervous about his very first rookie, because he keeps bumping his knee against Travie’s in the backseat. Maneater comes up on the radio and Parse elbows Travie in the ribs. It actually helps with the nerves.

He shouldn’t have worried, though.

The (gorgeous, Jesus Christ) blond dude who unlocks Travie’s front door is literally rolling around the floor with Travie’s dogs.

“Um,” Travie says. “Hi. You have the dogs?”

Parse walks past him to put their bags down.

“Yes,” Karlsson says, grinning at dog-Benji. “The dog-sitter brought them back an hour ago. They’re very friendly. Corey said you missed them.”

“He did,” Parse says. “How are you, man? I’m Kent Parson.”

“I know. And you’re Travis Nelson,” the kid says, tilting his head up to smile at Travie. He’s still looking at the dogs, which Travie immediately approves of. “I saw you play at Worlds. You’re really good.”

“Thanks, dude,” Travie says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’ve seen your tape.” Then he stops and squints. “Is that beard burn?”

“This one’s all yours, bud,” Parse calls from the other room, then laughs so hard that the dogs wander off to investigate.


End file.
